Masques
by bhut
Summary: What if Christine Johnson and Helen had worked together, rather than at odds to one another in the episode 3X09? Here's one way it could've went.


**Masques**

_Disclaimer: All of the characters belong to Impossible Pictures. _

_Note: It contains some of the official dialogue from the Primeval episode 3x9._

"Give me the artefact, or I'll shoot her!" Helen threatened, as she pressed a gun to Christine Johnson's neck.

"Fine, do it!" Lester said more jauntily than it would've expected of him.

"That's not funny, Lester!" Christine snapped.

"It is from where I stand."

"Oh really?" Surprisingly, it was Helen who spoke this time as she pulled down the gun and gave Christine a small shove in the back. "Well then, Christine, why don't you go and beat him up instead?"

Before anyone could react to that statement – Lester, in particular, resembled a gaping fish – Christine expertly flipped off her high-heel shoes, grabbed them in her hands instead, quickly trotted over to aforementioned Lester, and gave him a good kick, right where it _really_ hurts with such an effort, that the heavier man was taken literally off his feet into the air until he fell back down with a thump. _And then_ Christine Johnson was really onto him, hitting him with the flat sides of her shoes like a farmer thrashing wheat.

"Becker, help-" Lester wheezed, and naturally, Becker did just that. Unfortunately, Wilder of Christine's own forces had different ideas. Now that the immediate danger to his boss was apparently past, the animosity between Christine and James' people was back on, and as Becker whirled around to restrain Christine, Wilder grabbed him – and Becker immediately elbowed him in the gut. Still, as Wilder was forced to release the younger man, he also managed to kick him in the left knee, causing Becker to fall down as well, and in moments the two of them were going at it as well as their bosses.

Despite all the resulting chaos and anarchy – no one wanted to get really in the way of Christine Johnson, and Becker could probably fight his own battle – Danny and the others had the presence of mind to remember Helen Cutter, who at that point had stripped off her disguise completely and was staring at the artefact with an unreadable expression on her face, her handgun lying discarded at the other side of the table. Immediately, Connor grabbed it, clicked the trigger, and froze:

"It's empty?!" he exclaimed, confused.

"Obviously," Helen shrugged. "Do I look like Stephen to you? We know that I'm not military sniper or anything like that."

"That didn't prevent you from shooting Nick, your own husband!" Connor snapped bitterly.

"Yes, well, he wasn't much of a husband," Helen growled suddenly. "For more than ten years he treated me not as a wife, a woman, a lover, but as an accessory to himself, a missus to round him off while he spent time with his petrified bones, his horrible mother and his bleeping members of the academic circles. I had to give him some and got back nothing, not even a child! Why couldn't he just treat me the right way – I would've never gone through the first time anomaly back then!!"

"Your eyes are dry, though your voice is convincing," Abby said flatly.

"Oh, well," Helen said nonchalant once again. "Are we done now?"

"Yes," Christine nodded, her own voice rather emotionless as well. "As you can see for yourself. Now, if the boys are done too-"

"Christine Johnson, you're not leaving so easily," Danny said firmly. "I don't care just how high you are in civil service, you're-"

"Wait a sec, hon," Christine Johnson replied, as she grabbed her neck around the collarbone and pulled it upwards, peeling it off, mirrored by Helen Cutter at her position. Suddenly, instead of Christine Johnson and Helen Cutter there were... Helen Cutter and Christine Johnson...as well as a pair of latex masks that hit Danny straight in the face. "Wilder," Christine spoke sharply, even as she grabbed the artefact. "We must leave now before Helen's dinosaur breaks through."

As if cued, a loud roar echoed from the direction of the ARC's kitchen. Everybody, including Becker, froze, and immediately Christine Johnson and her cohorts took off in a sprinted run, even as the roar sounded again and again. "Wait-" Abby yelled in vain, as she realized something rather familiar about that roar, but it was too late. The ARC's rivals and their goal – the time anomaly artefact – were gone.

* * *

"So, let me get this straight," James Lester groaned some time later, as he lay in the ARC's hospital wing. "The woman that was supposedly Helen Cutter was Christine Johnson and vice versa? All because of two rubber masks?"

"Well, they are really good masks," Connor said apologetically. "We, uh-"

"Don't," Lester shook his head. "It makes sense now, there's no way Christine could ever know how to fight like that. Of course, it's one of the ways to beat the security system that we cannot prevent, eh?"

"Yeah," Becker muttered from the bunk next to Lester's. "Between Helen's CGI'd disguise and the totally non-technical masks, we were completely fooled. And Wilder, that rat, was in on it as well, I bet."

"Yeah, and he probably planed that sound recording device – you know, that dinosaur call? It was just a lion's roar with maximized volume on," Abby added bitterly.

"Well, let this be a lesson to us – never go for high-tech when low-tech can do," Lester said flatly. "Now, I, unfortunately, have to go and talk to people about Danny Quinn's order-"

"It's gone," Sarah said guiltily. "It must've been some sort of a self-destructing paper or something, 'cause all that's left of it on your table are ashes."

"Lovely," Lester winced as his bruises acted up again. "Quinn, you got into Helen's place before, I want you to do it again and bring the artefact back. Becker, the rest of you – the ARC is now officially at war, so get prepared."

The others just nodded and exchanged looks of agreement. The jokes were over now, and the some serious chronological fighting was most likely to begin.


End file.
